Better To Improve Smarter Balanced Test

The Connecticut Education Association recently suggested that Connecticut should abandon the Smarter Balanced test and work with a vendor to build a new standardized test. This suggests that the CEA believes that working with a for-profit company would be better than working with Smarter Balanced, an independent operating unit at UCLA.

I have worked on both the Smarter Balanced assessments and on Connecticut's previous assessments. My counter-suggestion to the CEA is simple: Work with Smarter Balanced to improve its test. High-quality test development takes several years, so you're unlikely to have a new assessment any time soon.

It is also not possible to build a test that reflects the entire CEA wish list. You cannot have a shorter test that provides more useful feedback to teachers and meets industry standards for reliability.

For the first time in history, we have scores aligned to something tangible and meaningful; passing scores indicate that students are on track toward entering college in credit-bearing courses. As a parent and teacher, this seems better than an arbitrary category called "proficient."

Shelbi Cole, Palm Harbor, Fla.

The writer worked for the state Education Department, 2010-2012, and was director of mathematics for the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium, 2012-2015.